I went through ‘conversion therapy’ – no trans person should face that torture again

‘Trans people should have exactly the same rights as everybody else.’ LGBT activists protest against conversion practices outside Downing Street on 10 April, 2022. Photograph: Tayfun Salcı/Zuma Press Wire/Rex/Shutterstock

You hear it all the time, the question: “When did you know you were trans?” The question should really be: “When did I know that the rest of the world didn’t behave in the same way as I did?”

When I came out at 14, more than 30 years ago, my mother thought I was gay and confused. She thought that if I could just learn to pee standing up and toughened up a bit, there wouldn’t be a problem.